


i'm building coffins with hammers and nails

by orphan_account



Series: Tumblr Prompts [5]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Darling Pan - Freeform, F/M, Storybrooke, Tumblr Prompts, awkward!peter, disillusioned!peter, helpful mary margaret and henry trying to help him get a life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-22
Updated: 2014-04-22
Packaged: 2018-01-20 09:41:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1505717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Devoid of all power and ferocity, Peter Pan does not flourish in Storybrooke. That is, until Henry gives him a chance to see her again.</p><p>This isn't a story about redemption. It's about new beginnings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm building coffins with hammers and nails

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt from gardenoftacos:
> 
> Dp canon divergence. Peter isnt killed but his powers are taken away from him. Wendy doesnt leave for london, the Darling family chooses to stay in Storybrooke. Awkward chance meetings between peter and wendy turn into fights turn into something more.

"You need to  _do_ something.”

Peter looks up from the too-small bed, over where his feet dangle from the lip of it, to where Henry Mills stands in his doorway. The kid’s face is accusing, borderline  _worried -_ for him? For the Pan? - underneath his thick, woolen beanie. His nose, red-tipped with cold.

He frowns, letting his head fall back to the pillow with a dejected  _thump_. Is it winter already? Peter’s concept of time is skewed like a length of string that’s been split down the middle, frayed and twisted. In Neverland (the word’s like a dagger in his chest, hot and sharp) the days could drag or they could be over in the space of two breaths, so long as they were  _his_ breaths, at his command. 

In this forsaken place, however, if the sun rises and falls any faster or slower it’s his own imaginings, and no amount of believing can change that. 

"Do something?" he asks the ceiling, finally. 

The sooner this conversation is over, the sooner he can go back to sleep. 

Peter Pan has always been a boy of  _dreams_ \- although, towards the end, perhaps he was made of more nightmarish stuff. There was a time when he laughed starlight, each peal bringing forth new constellations; the sound of it could make hearts  _soar_ , for when someone hears joy in its purest form, do they not ache to replicate it?

There was a time when he could fly with nothing but merriment to keep him afloat.

He’s come to rely on his dreams, now that the fucking pixie  _wrenched_ his power from him and he’s left a useless damned  _husk,_ a quivering grey shell,a shadow -

“ _Yeah,_ " Henry replies, "something. Anything."

Peter scoffs, keeping his eyes stubbornly fixed upwards. The dirty off-white of his tiny room is a familiar sight, but it does nothing to anchor him. He sees a grubby canvas where unsullied blue should be, dark brown covers instead of leafy green foliage, annoying midget Baelfires wasting air where  _she_ should stand. 

He bites his tongue. Thoughts of  _her_ are reserved for when he’s asleep. It doesn’t hurt so much when she’s only a wish away.

The jarring creak of old floorboards. Henry’s moving to the side of his bed, peering into the corner of his vision. Pan scowls.

"Regina wants you to get a job. She says you’re a freeloader."

This only makes him scowl  _more,_ and the lines grooved into his brow look like they were carved with a knife rather than mere irritation. “I’m  _not_ a freeloader.”

"Uh,  _yeah,_ you are.”

"Uh,  _no,_ I’m not.” he shoots back petulantly, through his teeth. He can’t quite garner the same hiss, the same authority that used to slick under his words like blood - his voice is weak, a pale imitation of the rich tones he once commanded.

"You don’t pay for this apartment, all you do is hole yourself up in here, you contribute  _nothing_ to the community,” Peter scoffs and goes to tell him that he’d be glad to punch that slimy pixie in the face and do Storybrooke a service, but Henry carries on, “and - and it’s depressing.”

"Doesn’t affect  _you._ ”

"Kinda does," the irritating boy sighs, " _actually._ As evil as you were -” the past tense sends another frisson of pain spasming from Peter’s bones to the blackened thing he calls a heart, but the boy doesn’t seem to notice the grief that curls his lip, ” - you’re sort of a hero, at least in the Disney movie.”

He stares wistfully off into the distance in a way that has Pan thinking it’s for dramatic tension, unspeaking. 

He grumbles out a sigh. “ _And?_ " he probes.

"And you were… pretty great, I’ll be honest. Even with all the heart-stealing and body-snatching, the whole thing was - well, it wasn’t  _good_  -“

"Please," Peter begs - he’s not above that, now - " _tell_ me you’re going somewhere with this.”

Henry clears his throat. “What I’ve been trying to say is,” he takes a deep breath, in which Peter faintly wonders if he could strangle himself with the stupid scarf Mary Margaret dropped off a few days ago that’s  _just_ within reach, “you had power, then. Even without it - you  _did_ stuff. You got what you wanted. How you are now? It’s pathetic.”

 _Pathetic._ The disgraced King of Neverland hauls himself into a sitting position, quick as a jungle cat, his nose inches from Henry’s. “Are you suggesting I get what I want, boy? Because,” he tries to make the words steel, but it does not come and so he settles for bronze instead, “last time I looked, I wanted every last one of you  _dead._ ”

To his credit, Baelfire’s whelp doesn’t flinch. “Even Wendy?”

"I - don’t talk to me about  _her._ " Peter flops back down on his bed, the fight all but gone from him.

"Dude," the boy sighs, "I get it. You don’t feel worthy of her, or whatever. You did some bad stuff, put her in a cage, all that. Not the best way to get a girl’s attention."

He splutters. “What would  _you_ know?”

"More than you."

He chokes out a bitter  _ha,_ rolling his eyes. “A bit young for that, aren’t you?”

"I seriously don’t think  _Peter Pan_ should be telling me I’m too young.” Henry retorts, one eyebrow raised knowingly. “I have to go. But there’s a job going at the diner, and I’m pretty sure my mom organised for you to have it.”

"I don’t care."

"Not even if I told you Wendy’s a regular?"

The boy leaves after that, throwing an impish grin over his shoulder - remarkably similar to the one  _he’s_ famous for, though much more kindhearted.

Peter thinks of riotous blonde curls and small, calloused hands in his.  _A regular._ He tries to picture himself serving her hot chocolate, or tea. The last time he gave her a drink in Neverland she’d thrown it at him.

He grimaces.

///

Two days later, Peter finds himself forcing a smile at the Charmings as they walk into the diner, leaving sugar-coated happiness  _everywhere._

He thinks about checking their booth for pixie dust, but he supposes that’s just wishful thinking.

"Welcome to Granny’s Diner," he says mechanically, taking the pencil from behind his ear and the notepad from the backpocket of his jeans, "how may I help you, today?"

Mary Margaret looks ecstatic; David fights a smile. “No need for courtesies, Peter!” she chirps. “How are you? It’s good to see you taking part in the community.”

 _Community._ That word again. “Uh. Good. I am.” He coughs, sounding to his own ears like that little green hairy thing on  _Star Battles_ or whatever it is Henry insists he watch. “How - how are you?”

She doesn’t notice - or, more likely, ignores - the way he forces the pleasantries through his teeth. “I’m fine, thank you.”

"That’s… good." he stands there nervously, floundering in the silence that follows.

David grimaces suddenly, jolting as if his wife has just jammed her elbow into his ribs. “ _Shit -_ uh, how are you… adjusting?”

He fights the urge to scorn. It’s been whole seasons since he was trapped in this ridiculously claustrophobic town, and the only people he’s spoken to in that time have been his boss, Emma Swan, Henry and now the Charmings. He’s lost any muscle he ever had lamenting in his bed, the ferocity is gone from him except for sharp, erratic bursts of temper that he cannot control, he’s lost everything that ever made his dead lump of a heart soar -  _adjusting_ is the wrong word.

"… fine," he says, instead.

David seems to hear the stiffness in his tone, and apparently wishes to continue this odd aura of polite conversation even less than he does, because a second later he offers a tight smile and exclaims, “Good! Two coffees, please.”

"Sugar or milk?" he holds the pencil with the tip just brushing paper; poised and ready. He wants out as soon as he can.

"None for me," Charming says.

"You’re sweet enough," his sickening counterpart teases, patting his hand. "Three for me."

Peter wants to vomit all over them. He nods, finishing the order, and then turns away from them just as the diner door opens.

He looks up as he’s tucking his pencil back behind his ear, and promptly jambs the eraser into his left eye when he sees who’s standing at the entrance.

“ _Ow -_ fuck - ” he curses, dropping the offending implement.

Wendy Darling stares at him, her pink lips parted in shock. She’s wearing jeans, just like him - something he  _never_ pictures her sporting - and a red coat, one hand already fishing in its pockets for change.

Friday afternoon, just like Henry said. Honestly, he didn’t think the boy was telling the truth.

"Peter," she breathes.

Her voice is sweet, but not smotheringly so like Mary Margaret’s - there’s a wilderness there, too. Strong soil beneath the flowers, power behind the crystal clear waters.  _Neverland._ He wonders if she wakes with the scent of the jungle lingering in her nose like he does; the smack of wet leaves and dirt, blood on soil.

He can’t bring himself to speak. He only stares, one hand clapped over his injured eye, the other gripping the notebook so hard the pages tear.

"What - " she casts a glance at the Charmings. Exhales shakily. Her eyelashes flutter in tandem with her hands; nervous, twitchy. "What are you doing here?"

He wishes for some of his old cruelty. A chance to grin with lips like knives and poison on his tongue, to hiss  _i’m here for you darling_ and watch her little hummingbird heart beat wildly against her ribcage, to listen to her footsteps pounding into the jungle floor, to press close against her and touch her  _fire._

"I’m working," he manages to choke out, wondering how her mouth would feel on his, now. How she’d taste.

(he doesn’t think he can bite anymore)

"Oh." she whispers, swallowing. "Well, I - I’ll just. Go."

"No -" he starts towards her, the words  _stay please don’t leave_ teetering on the edge of his tongue but he can’t quite force them into the frigid air between them, and then she whirls away in a blur of blonde and red, and it’s just like how she used to run from him but this time,  _this time,_ his heart beats as if it’s trying to burst from his chest, and the only thing he can taste is bitterness and thoughts half-spun.

The scent of forget-me-nots lingers behind her; it seems to go hand-in-hand with loneliness.

**Author's Note:**

> Read & Review!


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